


In Darkness and the Light

by ladygrey3



Category: The Song of Achilles - Madeline Miller
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Briseis and Agamemnon are mentioned, Dogs, Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-11
Updated: 2019-07-11
Packaged: 2020-06-26 15:01:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19770670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladygrey3/pseuds/ladygrey3
Summary: When they first started living together, Patroclus told him, I love how you just pose when you do anything. Drinking coffee or watching TV. You just strike these attitudes.It’s not intentional, Achilles had replied, not knowing whether or not to be insulted.I know, Patroclus said. That’s why I love it. It’s so you.Achilles and Patroclus are in love, and happy, and they get a dog.





	In Darkness and the Light

Achilles wakes to an empty bed and the cool silver light of the early morning. He rolls over, drowsy, still half-muffled in the warm haze of sleep. The sheets on Patroclus’s side of the bed are rumpled and warm. Achilles stares blearily at the concave pillow until he realizes that the dark and indistinct shape sitting by the window is a person. His person, specifically. 

Patroclus is staring out the window, the sunlight falling on his face like liquid mercury. Achilles hauls himself up and crawls across the bd, examining him curiously. Patroclus’s face is unmoving and serene as a mask. He gazes out the window, unblinking, opaque eyes fixed on the grey wash of the street below. 

Experimentally, Achilles wraps one arm around Patroclus’s shoulders and presses a kiss into his dark riot of hair. “Good morning,” he says, since this is typically a safe opening gambit. 

Patroclus absently pats Achilles’s elbow and says nothing. Sensing that this is the extent of Patroclus’s current desire for interaction, Achilles kisses him again and pulls away. This is not particularly unusual. Sometimes Pat just sort of drifts off, leaving most of his consciousness behind. It never lasts long and it usually means he’s thinking intensely about something. Achilles puts on a shirt, brushes his teeth, dumps water and instant coffee into the coffeemaker. As it grinds busily away, he does a preliminary set of stretches next to the kitchen table. Usually he does these in the bedroom, because Patroclus likes to watch him do it. Sometimes he says it’s because he enjoys the grace and power of his body; sometimes he says it’s because he looks like an idiot. Achilles is pretty okay with it either way. 

Patroclus emerges from the bedroom, blinking sleepily, as if he has just woken. He pours two cups of coffee, one of which he fills to the brim and leaves black and sticky as hot tar. The other cup he fills halfway, and then puts in two ice cubes and an inch of milk, turning it a silky beige. He leaves the second cup on the counter and takes the first one to the table, where he drinks it in quick little sips like a cat, watching as Achilles bends backwards and then forwards, pressing his palms against the cold tile. 

“We should get a dog,” he says. 

Achilles unfolds back to a standing position, considering this. “Alright,” he says. 

Pat’s eyebrows lift over the rim of the mug. “That was easier than I was expecting it to be.”

“I mean, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t.” Achilles twists his arm behind his head, feeling the slow pull of tendons against bone. “Although I am curious about why you want a dog specifically now.”

“I don’t know,” Patroclus says slowly, which means that there is a reason and he knows what it is but feels self-conscious about it. He takes another sip of coffee, leaving a rusty smudge on his upper lip.

“I had this dream,” he says. “You were playing with a dog, in the yard, and I was there watching you. And I thought, this is everything that I want. And I woke up and realized that I actually could have all of that. So there you go.” 

A warm golden flower of love opens in Achilles’s chest. He smiles at Patroclus, who is staring into the middle distance over the rim of his coffee cup, his eyes still soft with sleep. 

“Well, that does sound pretty nice,” he says. “Although—and I hate to be the one to have to break this to you—we don’t have a yard. We live in an apartment. I don’t know if you’ve noticed.” 

Patroclus’s gaze focuses, and he snorts. “Asshole.” 

“Yeah,” Achilles agrees, blithely. “Do you have any particular dogs in mind? We can get one of those ones that helps with anxiety or whatever. The trained ones.” 

“No. Let’s just go to the pound.” Patroclus shifts, sitting back in his chair. “We should get a rescue, if we find one we want.” 

Achilles lets his arm fall and moves towards the counter, where the cup of coffee awaits him. “We can go today, if you like. I got nothing after work.” 

Patroclus nods. “I don’t know what my homework situation is going to be like, but I think I’ll be able to go. I’ll text you if anything changes.” 

Achilles inclines his head and sips the cup of milky coffee. The faintest hint of bitterness lingers around the edges, weakened by the milk and the ice. The sunlight filters through the blinds, throwing long pale fingers across the floor. Neither of them says anything for a long moment. 

When they first started living together, Patroclus told him, _I love how you just pose when you do anything. Drinking coffee or watching TV. You just strike these attitudes._

_It’s not intentional,_ Achilles had replied, not knowing whether or not to be insulted. 

_I know,_ Patroclus said. _That’s why I love it. It’s so you._

There are certain things which Achilles knows, without doubt or equivocation, to be true. Many of them he cannot actively recall ever learning; they simply exist in his mind, unquestionable as gravity, solid objects on which other truths are built. 

He knows, for instance, that his body will always do whatever he wants it to do, even when the things he wants from it should probably be impossible. Much of his life is structured around this truth. He is aware that most other bodies do not function in this way, although he has no idea what that sort of body would be like. Sometimes he thinks of his body as something that doesn’t really belong to him, just a sort of tool or machine which is very simple but which somehow only he knows how to operate. Other times he feels like his body is the only real part of him, like every cell inside him is burning with electric awareness, and he forgets there is anything in the world besides blood and heat and motion. 

He knows that orange skittles are better than green ones. He knows that he and Patroclus are fated to be together for always, because Patroclus likes the green ones better and gives all the orange ones to him. He knows that Patroclus’s father is an unimaginable asshole, and his own mother is probably legitimately insane, and there’s really nothing to be done about either of those things. He knows that his parents were only ever together because his father saw his mother as a beautiful and dangerous thing that he could own, and he knows that there is and has always been a risk that someone will see him the same way. He knows that Patroclus has never once wanted to own him, nor ever even thought about him in terms of ownership at all. 

He knows also that Patroclus is a better person than he is, even though this is not something that Patroclus himself would ever believe. In a vague way, he understands that Patroclus is a better person than he is because Patroclus is just generally more of a person than he is. More human. He has known this for a long time, and it does not trouble him. Whatever he is, he was made to be, and there is little point in fighting that. Patroclus, of course, is always worried that he somehow isn’t what he’s supposed to be; not strong enough, not clever enough, not a man in the way that he’s meant to be a man. Achilles has never concerned himself with these questions. He is himself, and Patroclus is Patroclus, and this is as it is meant to be. If either of them were different, they might not fit together in the way they do, and that’s the most important thing. 

He knows that he would do basically anything for Patroclus. He knows that as long as he and Patroclus are together, things will be more or less okay. He knows that if they are not together, nothing can ever be okay. He knows that he loves Patroclus, and will love him forever, and that while there are many other pleasant and interesting things in this world, this is the only one that truly matters. 

It’s good, to know these things. It makes life a little simpler. He hopes that Patroclus knows a few of them as well, at least the ones that have to do with him. But even if he doesn’t, he’s sure that there are other important things that Patroclus knows and he doesn’t, and he looks forward to finding them out. He figures that he’ll have a lifetime to learn all the special things that Patroclus knows. 

In the middle of the afternoon, Briseis texts Achilles a picture of a golden retriever puppy without comment or context, which Achilles takes to mean that Patroclus has told her about their dog-related plans. Achilles finds a picture online of another golden retriever puppy, this one wearing a party hat, and sends it to her in response. If he has his timing right, she should be in her endocrinology class right now. He hopes that she sees it while the professor is talking. That should be entertaining. 

It’s taken a while to get Briseis to trust him. Initially she did not like him, for reasons which, in retrospect, were entirely legitimate. But, largely through Patroclus’s incessant positive propaganda campaign, she seems to have ended up approving of him, in a conditional way. Achilles likes her. He has little choice in the matter; she’s Patroclus’s best friend, and she’s been good for him. 

He gets off work early. Agamemnon has one of his rare moments of common human decency and expels him from the gym. “You’re no good when you’re distracted,” he says. Achilles drives home with the windows down and the radio spilling out a bright ribbon of music. The chill of early spring is breaking, and the world feels fresh, honest, wide awake. He sings along to the song, of which he only knows the chorus. The lyrics make him think of Patroclus: _everything I am is yours, everything I am is yours._

When he gets home the phone is ringing, like a loud voice echoing through the house. He picks it up without checking caller I.D. “Hello?”

“Oh,” his mother says. She sounds faintly surprised, as if she had not expected to hear his voice, despite calling his number. “Well. Hello, Achilles.”

“Hi, Mother,” Achilles says. He feels something cold and heavy settle in his gut. He could have just checked the fucking I.D. If he plays his cards right, he may be able to get out of this before it gets too awkward, but he never seems to be able to play his cards right when it comes to his mother. 

There is a long, airless moment of silence. 

“How are you?” his mother says, finally. She has, as always, recovered seamlessly from her initial disorientation, and now sounds utterly composed, her voice as even and absolute as the pulse of waves on a beach. 

“Fine,” Achilles says. “Just got home.” He has deliberately avoided ever sharing his work schedule with his mother, so as to dodge precisely this occurrence; if she doesn’t know when to call him, hopefully she’ll be less likely to call. 

"Good,” his mother says. “That’s good.” 

His mother’s deep and undisguised disdain for Agamemnon is one of the things on which she and Achilles fully agree. The problem is her deep and undisguised disdain for literally everyone else in his life as well. 

“How are you?” Achilles asks. 

This is the immediate and spectacular trigger for a diatribe about whatever the fuck has inconvenienced her today; some lawyer was rude, she split one of her fingernails, et cetera et cetera. “At least it was raining,” she finishes bleakly. His mother has always liked rain, including being caught out in it. It’s one of her few traits he feels comfortable categorizing as kind of adorable. 

“What about you?” she asks finally, as something of an afterthought. 

“Fine,” he says again. He scratches at the skin next to his fingernail, feeling it tear. “You know. Normal day.” And then, out of a sudden and demonic desire to stir shit up, “Going to look at some dogs with Pat later.” 

“Dogs,” his mother says, smoothly ignoring the reference to Patroclus as she always does. “Don’t tell me you’re thinking about getting one.” 

“We are, actually.” 

“Hm,” his mother says, somehow managing to convey an ocean of cool distaste with a single syllable. “They’re nasty animals. Drooly, smelly. And they tear up furniture. I’ve never cared for them.”

“Yes,” Achilles says flatly. “I’m aware of that.” 

“A cat is a better pet. If you need a pet at all.” 

“Well, we’ve decided on a dog.”

“You’ll change your mind,” his mother says airily. “Just seeing what they’re really like should do it.” 

“Mother,” Achilles says, “is there a reason you called?” 

There is a long, deeply uncomfortable pause. 

“Yes,” his mother says. “I’ve forgotten the password your father uses for his Amazon Prime account. Can you ask him?”

It’s obviously a lie, and not a particularly clever or enthusiastic one, either. Achilles knows the password by heart anyway, and recites it to her dutifully. She dithers around for a few minutes after, reminds him that dogs are terrible, and then says “Alright,” and hangs up, leaving him staring at the phone in his hand. 

The conversation itself isn’t particularly upsetting, but the fact that it happened at all puts Achilles on edge. He prefers to forget his mother’s existence entirely, if he can, and normally he’s pretty good at it. He feels itchy and nervy, a restless, ugly energy crawling around inside his skin. So he goes and does something to make himself feel better, which turns out to be pushups, as it generally is. He works until his body hums with mindless strain, and there’s no room in his mind for anything but the pull of muscles and the liquid movement of endorphins through his veins. 

One of the first things that Briseis ever said to him—to him alone, not to him and Patroclus—was _You don’t really have an off switch, do you?_ A lot of people had said similar things to him, but usually they said it like it was a good thing. Briseis said it like one might say _you have something in your teeth._ It was one of the first times Achilles had thought he might get to like her. 

Patroclus comes home in the middle of the afternoon to find him in the middle of this third set of sit-ups with Mötorhead blasting in the background like a thunderstorm. Achilles feels the soft pressure of cool dark eyes on him and ignores it. He hears Patroclus dropping his textbooks on the bed and moving to turn the music down. 

“Hey,” Patroclus says. His voice is carefully even. 

“Hey,” Achilles says, and then, deciding to cut to the end of this particular conversation, “Mom called.” 

“Oh,” Patroclus says quietly. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. It wasn’t that bad. Just—you know.”

Patroclus says nothing, because he does, of course, know how it is. Achilles hauls himself through one more sit-up and then stops. Patroclus is here now; the physical activity portion of the feeling better program is over. 

“Are you still up for dog-shopping?” Patroclus asks. “We can just stay home if you want. Do it tomorrow.”

“No,” Achilles says. “I don’t think that playing with dogs is going to make me feel any worse.”

“Yeah, alright.” Patroclus stretches lazily. “Go take a shower and then we can go.”

Achilles frowns. “Come on, I don’t smell or anything.”

“You’re an animal. It’s a matter of principle. Go take a damn shower.”

Achilles waggles his eyebrows theatrically. “Care to come along and make sure I do it right?”

“You are a danger to yourself and others,” Patroclus says, but he’s grinning bright as a flower, and when Achilles reaches out to curl his fingers in his shirt, he doesn’t pull away. 

The sun is still high and hot when they go to the shelter. Patroclus drives, because it is something which he apparently actually enjoys doing, and they listen to his weedy, wailing indie rock playlist. Every so often a show tune erupts out of the speakers, bright and wild as a firework, because Patroclus likes to say you have to live into the cliches you choose. 

The woman at the shelter is a grad student named Andromache. Apparently she and Patroclus have seen each other in passing on campus. She is very tall, with long brown hair and a sweater covered in dog hair, holding a ring of keys. Patroclus is instantly smitten with her, in the brief, confused way that he sometimes is with women. Achilles is used to this, and it has never bothered him all that much. Personally, he’s never felt even the slightest spark of interest in women, but he knows that Patroclus’s inclinations are slightly more diverse than his own. Patroclus has always stammered and done double-takes around a certain kind of intellectually serious dark-haired girl, which included Briseis for several years. Achilles is largely unconcerned by this. Physical attraction is just something happens; he is the one Patroclus chose, with his mind and his heart. Besides, he’s prettier than any of the girls Pat likes. 

Andromache leads them back into a long concrete room which is absolutely filled with dogs. Lines of wire crates march down along the walls, their doors hanging open, and between them is a sea of fur and paws and tails and happily lolling tongues. The stained concrete floor of the room is strewn with mats and squeaky toys, which the dogs instantly abandon when they come into the room. Achilles finds himself the target of forty-five pounds of hound, face marked with scars, aimed directly at his kneecaps; it takes him a good minute to realize this is meant as a gesture of welcome and affection. Next to him Patroclus is laughing and trying to pet five separate dogs at the same time, all of whom are bouncing around him like they’ve been waiting their whole lives to meet him. Andromache is rather half-heartedly attempting to shoo them away, but it’s obvious that this tidal wave of canine joy is in fact the desired effect of this particular room. 

Achilles runs his hand over the dog’s head. Its fur is stiff and silky, punctuated by the puckered seams of the scars. He looks down at the brown nose busily moving around his ankles and decides that Patroclus was one hundred percent correct and this is the perfect time to get a dog. In fact, there is no wrong time to get a dog and they probably should have done so before. He adds this new knowledge to his list of things which are true. 

“All of these guys are unclaimed,” Andromache says. She’s kneeling, scratching under the chin of a basset hound which appears to be more ears than dog. “You can’t take any of them home today, but if you find one you love, you can give us your information and we’ll get you the paperwork sometime this week. You can come back, make sure you’re sure, take them home if you still want to.”

“I want all of them,” Patroclus says promptly, and then shakes his head. “No, I don’t really want all of them. That’s not responsible. Oh, but I kind of do. Look at them! They’re so cute.” 

Achilles grins. Some of the dogs have lost interest and returned to their usual doggy pursuits, shredding toys and slurping water eagerly from a big shallow bowl by the back wall. There is a soft blur of movement in one of the wire crates near the bowl. Achilles blinks and sees a smudge of pale grey and two soft dark hollows that might be eyes. 

“Who’s that?” he says to Andromache, indicating the crate with the hand which is not occupied with a dog. 

Andromache cranes her head, and then smiles, a gentle little twist of the lips. “That’s Bella. She’s just a little shy. Socially awkward, you know. She’ll come say hi when she’s ready.”

Patroclus lifts his face from the extravagant ruff of a tiny mutt, eyes wide, and says “Bella?” in a tone that makes Achilles grin even wider, because Pat is in many ways constantly surprising and in some ways deeply, wonderfully predictable. 

“You can go say hi, if you’d like,” Andromache says, visibly amused. “Just give her a little space. I’m going to let you all get acquainted, but I’ll be right outside. Bang on the door if you want something.”

Patroclus, who clearly tuned out at _you can go say hi,_ is wading through the dog lake towards the back of the room. Achilles gives Andromache a two-fingered salute which is only somewhat meant sarcastically and turns to follow him. Immediately, a ball of yellow fur kamikaze-dives in to slap its heavy wet nose directly against his ear and then lick from there, leaving a wet stripe on his cheek. Achilles laughs despite himself, wrestling the dog away from his face, whereupon it contents himself by slobbering over his hands. 

He looks up to see Patroclus crouched in front of the wire crate, peering inside. From closer up it becomes obvious that Bella is a small pitbull, barely out of puppyhood, with fur the grey of fine fresh ash. She’s curled up at the back of her crate on a torn mat, eyeing Patroclus mournfully through those big wet eyes. Her paws are easily the size of her whole face. 

“Hey there, Bella,” Patroclus says. His voice is careful and soft, almost prayerlike. “Hey, there, beautiful. Did you know you’re the cutest thing in the world? Is it okay if I say hi?”

He places the tips of his fingers on the chipped bottom rung of the crate’s door. Bella pulls back, shrinking into herself, and then cautiously leans forward to snuffle at the air around Patroclus’s fingers. She seems to not be put off by what she smells, because she inches forward, sliding one big clumsy paw towards the front of the crate. 

“There,” Patroclus murmurs. “It’s okay. See? It’s okay. There you are, sweetheart.”

His voice is as calm and hushed as the gentle patter of rain on a window. He is looking at Bella with perfect focus, as if she is the only thing in the world. His fingers twitch, but do not move forward, letting her scoot slowly towards him. In his eyes, Achilles can see a brilliant warmth tucked inside the darkness. It is not there very often, and it is beautiful in a different way every time it appears. 

Watching him, Achilles experiences an event inside him which he does not know how to interpret. His heart seems to fill up with light, like a balloon. It’s like the white-hot adrenaline thrill of winning, but steadier, sweeter, as solid and uncompromising as the pull of the tide. It’s so sudden that it’s almost painful, but he knows immediately that it’s just about one of the best things he can feel, and he never wants to feel anything else again. And somehow it’s all about Patroclus, and the light in his eyes, and his slow, sweet voice. None of it is possible without those things. 

Bella finally brushes her little black nose against the ridge of Patroclus’s knuckles. She looks up at him with shining dark eyes, perfectly wide and innocent. Patroclus laughs, and then says “I think this is the one. It’s got to be her. Right?” He glances up at Achilles to gauge his reaction. 

“Yeah,” Achilles says. “Right.” He is aware that this is important, and he should probably be contributing more to the conversation, but he is still dazed by whatever is happening inside him, its astonishing radiance and size. 

Something must show on his face, because a tiny wrinkle appears between Patroclus’s brows. “What is it?”

‘What’s what?” Achilles asks distantly. 

“You’re looking at me funny.”

It’s not like he didn’t know he loved Patroclus already, but this is different. It feels like being weightless, like knowing that you’re never not going to be happy again and that the world is actually pretty okay to live in. And with it, related to it but not identical, he can sense something else. This is something he’s more familiar with; it’s an impulse, of which he’s had rather a lot in his life. But this one feels like a charging bull—very big and moving very fast, and almost impossible to escape. 

There is a small part of him which is saying, _you can’t do this. This is crazy._ And there’s a much bigger part saying _why the fuck not? Why can’t I? Says who?_

Well, he’s lived on impulse his entire life, and he’s doing alright so far. 

“I was just thinking,” he says. “I love you. Do you want to get married?”

For a moment there is nothing on Patroclus’s face but vacant shock. Then a very small smile touches his lips and begins to spread, and it occurs to Achilles that he has clearly made a terrible mistake, because that smile is the best thing in the entire world, so now Achilles has to rescind his proposal so that he can ask Patroclus to marry him again and again, like maybe every morning, and see that smile every day for the rest of his life. 

“Yeah,” Patroclus says. The smile is enormous now, but his voice is very small. “Yeah, let’s do that.”

“Cool,” Achilles says, and then stares as Patroclus dissolves into a fit of helpless, bubbly giggles. Bella licks the side of his thumb, visibly somewhat confused. 

“I love you a lot,” Patroclus says finally, having regained some degree of control over himself. 

“I love you a lot too,” Achilles replies. He has the sense that maybe he should be offended on some level, but he isn’t, maybe because he deeply and genuinely doesn’t care. Anything is worth it if it makes Patroclus laugh like that, or look at him with that glow in his eyes, like the beginnings of fireworks. Anything at all. 

Bella nudges Patroclus’s hand, clearly ready to be petted. Patroclus glances down and runs two fingers between her silky ears. “Come meet this dog,” he says. “And then I’m going to call Bri.”

“Sounds good,” Achilles says, and he lets his fiancé take his hand and guide his fingers down to rest in Bella’s short, soft fur. 

**Author's Note:**

> Written for my friend Maddie, who asked for something unambiguously happy.


End file.
